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To: VOCALIST <vocalist>
From: Katherine Craig
Subject: Exposing children to head voice sound
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I have a question. Over 20 years ago when I took voice at college the first
thing my teacher did was to make me listen to recordings of Victoria de los
Angeles to hear what head voice sounded like. I sang "chesty" and "scoopy"
and I don't think I had ever heard anyone sing with a head voice (I was and
am a violinist but like everyone else listened to rock and pop almost
exclusively except for string and orchestral music). It was helpful to
listen to Victoria and I learned how to do it right but it made me self
conscious about my singing. Anyway, in our culture, almost every venue of
music; church, tv, radio, etc. glorifies and promotes the chesty, scoopy
sound (and they make all the big bucks) and it is hard to find a "heady"
sound to serve as a model.

My kids like Julie Andrews and Charlotte Church (and me) but the first two
voices are not something I want them to even think of emulating being so big
and mature sounding. (I finally saw Charlotte singing on Leno the other
night and she really did have a chin wobble. Is it your opinion that it is
nervous tension or it is conscious?) So my kids (7 and 8) just sing for
fun, we are just getting into round singing and they sing with the just for
fun kids choir at church. They also play recorder. I don't want to train
them as singers but just help them enjoy singing and help keep them from
forming bad habits and give them a diversity of good models. I formed bad
habits all on my own just from what I listened to.

So, here is my question. What are some good vocal models to listen to that
are enjoyable for children? Or for anyone for that matter; teens, adults,
Americans who have only heard pop style singing. Perhaps some recordings of
nice art songs mostly in English from a wide variety of composers and times,
not heavy operatic stuff. Maybe I am really looking for recommendations of
music for me to listen to and to recommend to others too. Music our whole
family will enjoy and that will subtly promote good habits too. Does this
make sense?